ut; the
children wanted to play with it, but they only frightened it; it ran to
the door which was open, and managed to slip away among the bushes,
where it lay down in the new fallen snow.

It would be very sad to tell you all the duckling suffered that cold
winter; but spring came at last, and the young bird felt that his wings
were grown strong. He flew away, and stopped at last in a beautiful
garden near a fine piece of water. On it he saw two magnificent white
birds swimming. "I will fly to those royal birds," he thought, "they
will kill me because I am ugly; but I had rather be killed by them than
pecked by ducks, or beaten by hens." So he flew to the water and swam
towards the swans. "Kill me," he said, as they sailed towards him, and
he bowed his head meekly. But what did he see in the stream? Not a dark
grey ugly duckling, but a beautiful swan! To be born in a duck's nest in
a farm-yard, does not matter to a bird, if it is hatched from a swan's
egg. Yes, he too was a swan. Now he would have friends to love him, and
nobody would scorn and ill-use him any more. Ho rustled his feathers,
curved his slender neck and cried joyfully, "I never thought such good
was in store for me when I was an ugly duckling."

* * * * *

Transcriber's Notes:

Obvious punctuation errors repaired.

The Ugly Duckling: Page 8: "whitness" changed to "whiteness" (with
dazzling whiteness)

End of Project Gutenberg's Aunt Friendly's Picture Book., by Anonymous

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